"Down-stairs," hissed the owl, without ever lifting his eyes from the
book, which all the time he read upside down, so learned was he.
"On your honour, as a respectable old owl?" asked Richard.
"No," hissed the owl; and Richard was almost sure that he was not
really an owl. So he stood staring at him for a few moments, when all
at once, without lifting his eyes from the book, the owl said, "I will
sing a song," and began:--
"Nobody knows the world but me.
When they're all in bed, I sit up to see
I'm a better student than students all,
For I never read till the darkness fall;
And I never read without my glasses,
And that is how my wisdom passes.
Howlowlwhoolhoolwoolool.
"I can see the wind. Now who can do that?
I see the dreams that he has in his hat;
I see him snorting them out as he goes--
Out at his stupid old trumpet-nose.
Ten thousand things that you couldn't think
I write them down with pen and ink.
Howlowlwhooloolwhitit that's wit.
"You may call it learning--'tis mother-wit.
No one else sees the lady-moon sit
On the sea, her nest, all night, but the owl,
Hatching the boats and the long-legged fowl.
When the oysters gape to sing by rote,
She crams a pearl down each stupid throat.
Howlowlwhitit that's wit, there's a fowl!"
And so singing, he threw the book in Richard's face, spread out his
great, silent, soft wings, and sped away into the depths of the tree.
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